Review; Brushables by Kuretake

Product Details

Manufacturer/Brand; Kuretake; Zig Memory System

Item: Brushables

RRP at time of writing: around £9 for set of 4

Reason For Buying

These pens have been on my wish list for some time, especially after seeing how flexible the nibs were, on a demonstration show on Create and Craft TV. I was lucky enough to be sent some samples and asked to review these pens by Kuretake.

Pros/Cons

Being a rubber stamper at heart, I put these pens through their paces, not just for lettering but for a whole range of crafting situations. Here’s how I tested the pens and the results

For lettering these pens excel, they have super smooth flexible nibs that make expressive styles possible.

Colouring Rubber Stamps; Excellent for multi coloured stamping. Resulting stamped image was clear even from a detailed stamp. As when using other pens for this purpose, you will need to huff on the ink before you stamp to keep it wet.

Colouring Clear Stamps; These pens work well on clear stamps. I found it best to colour entire image, stamp on scrap card, then re-ink the stamp to use on actual card. This resulted in less beading on clear stamps. Again, they worked well on detailed images.

Colouring Stamped Images; On some cardstock the ink did bleed, so do a test on scrap card first. Great on small areas but although the brush tips are great for filling in large areas, as with all pens of this type they did leave lines if you over lap previous strokes. Also being quite so juicy they did saturate the card. Try on card over 160 gsm.

Heat Embossing images. I had mixed success with this, small text stamps worked ok if you get the powder on FAST. A lot depends on the paper/card you use and how quick you are with the powder application. Heat immediately as the powder dries fast on the ink.

Easy Clean Up; After using the pens on the rubber stamps, if I cleaned the ink off immediately they left no residue on rubber and only slight staining on clear stamps. If you have coloured a larger stamp and the ink has partially dried, you will find some residue of ink. Try using stamp cleaners and it should come off fine. (Not yet tested that).

Colour & Ink Quality: Excellent. Bright vivid colours and very juicy pens. Although the pens say they are non bleed, do test them on the card you wish to use them on before you use them on your main project. There was no bleed when colouring a rubber stamp and then stamping onto the card. But for colouring in a stamped image there was some fuzzing 7 bleeding. The same was true if I tried lettering. Just do a scribble test on spare card first😉 There are currently 24 colours in the range.

Storage; Big advantage over ink pads, in that the pens are easy to store. Keep them stored flat, so the ink doesn’t all flood to one end or you will get a pen where only one end works! These pens feature double ended nibs, you get a tint of the colour from the other end of the pen. So 2 colours for each pen!

Kuretake Brushables feature double ended brush nibs

Build Quality

Brush Tip: The nib is flexible and perfect for lettering, it is forgiving on rubber stamps. The pens just glide over paper making them a joy to use. Some of the pens I received were ex demo and had a furry tip to the pen, this suggests over time they may wear a little. My suggestion would be to keep a separate set for letting than the ones you colour stamps with, as the abrasion from the stamp may cause wear over time.

Lids: The lids fit well and stay in place.

Value for Money

These pens are good value for money, especially as you get two colours per pen. There are 24 colours in the range making a total of 48 (one at each end). Plenty of scope to play with. I would recommend these for new stampers as a top quality product that will last well. A good way to have a generous collection of inks to stamp with.

Would I buy it Again?

Yes, and I definitely want to explore more of their range of pens. Especially the calligraphy markers. I use their Zig Writter for Art Journalling and the Zig Glue pens all the time and find them excellent. These are a quality product by a well-respected company.

Summing up

Great value for money, great for travelling as you can take a large selection of colours in a small space. They compare well to the Tsukeneko pens I have, with the advantage of a much more flexible nib. The only downside I can really find is that, although the manufacturers can supply individual colours to retailers, I’ve only been able to find them for sale as sets of 4, in colour tones. I would have bought these pens before If I could have bought them individually or in sets of say 12 in mixed colours.

If you love lettering you’ll love these pens🙂 I’m off to practice some calligraphy🙂🙂🙂

Links

Kuretake The UK Website with full range of products. You can download a catalogue which will show you entire product range with visual of the entire pallet of colours in the range.

Zig Brushables This is the Brushables page on the Kuretake Website. It includes a video demo of lettering

In the coming months, when there is better light. I hope to make my own tutorial video featuring these pens and show you how to use them with rubber stamps. At which point I’ll add the link to the demo here.

Best wishes and thanks for reading, see you soon

Billie🙂

**UPDATE**

When I posted this review on Twitter this morning, Kuretake sent me this message:

Related

8 Responses

Enjoyed your review of the brushables. I have some of the Zig writers and Calligraphy pens and even though I have had them for several years they are still going strong so they certainly last well without drying out.
Can I have yet more pens? Have just started exploring Letraset Promarkers and have a ton of pencils, chalks, pens lol I await your videos with anticipation.

Thanks🙂 Glad you liked it. I must have been a Magpie in an earlier life I can’t resist a bundle of pens, all the pretty colours. I have a few Pro Markers and could get hooked on buying them but I wory about the fumes with the birds so will stick to other kinds. Would love to try the caligraphy markers, have seen them on C&C and they look a lot of fun. I do a bit of calligraphy sometimes. Mainly roundhand🙂 or my variation of it anyway🙂 I’m not fessing up to the amount of pens and pencil’s I’ve ‘collected’ over the years, but don’t regret any of them. Its good to have options🙂

Maybe this will be a year of trying new creative things🙂 that would be nice. Videos will be a while yet, we are stuck in dull n wet weather so camera wouldn’t see much! Bring on sunnier weather🙂

I, too, have had a Magpie’s instincts when it came to paper and anythng with colour. Long before I started crafting I would spend ages in any shop that sold writing paper and would spend my pocket money on it – plain or coloured it didn’t much matter. I just loved the feel and texture of paper. Then it went onto pens, pencils and now inks, H2Os – anything with luscious colour and not necessarily to use🙂

Billie have you tried the daylight bulbs? They are marvellous for bright light and are also low energy. They cost more than the low energy bulbs but the difference is well worth it. The bulbs give a bright white light and are fabulous for crafting under as you can see the true colour.
I bought two bulbs from ebay – one for my crafting area where I can video, take photos and craft and one for the kitchen where my DH does his watercolour painting.

Yeah I have tried daylight bulbs but so far without sucess😦 the two I’ve tried so far both set off migraines within minutes. The bulbs are often only available these days as florecest tubes, the curly ones. DH found one that wasn’t but I got flashing light migraine with that one too. Its a big shame as I agree the light itself is superb to craft by. If you’ve seen my Dreamkuts video, that was filmed under one, before we worked out what was causing the headaches.

It’s good that the new bulbs are energy saving and all that, but for those of us who struggle with the florescent alternatives, by making more & more bulbs only available like this, it leaves us somewhat nowhere. No wonder so many people with epelepsy were stockpiling the other bulbs. Had the same problem with the daylight alternative on the spotlight bulb too😦 Perhaps its my funny wiring that causes the dyslexia, I seem to process light strangly. DOH Trust me to be awkward.

That is such a shame Billie as it would have solved your lighting problem.
Under mains electricity I don’t notice a problem but when we switch over to the generator to charge the batteries then I do notice a slight flicker that makes me feel nauseaous. Touch wood I don’t have migraines that frequently but certain lights, wallpaper or fabric patterns (such as stripes), sunlight flickering through trees or fences all trigger nausea and giddiness. One day one of our daughters was wearing a lovely new sweater but I had to ask her to cover it up as it was making me feel quite poorly – it all depends on how wide the stripes are!!🙂
I was once told that I am possibly borderline epileptic so that makes two of us that are strange🙂
Strobe lighting at discos and nightclubs used to have the same effect on me – now that was very awkward when out to impress some young man🙂

Thank you for your information! so nice!
I am considering to buy this set…
But I still have one question,,,
Do this one work well on blending color?
I mean to create shadow effect like what copic markers did?

These pens are water based, to blend I would scribble colour onto an acrylic block or sheet of acetate etc, and pick up colour using a water brush, you will get a more water colour effect. Start with a very washed out layer and try adding gradually more ink colour to the mix. Do not dip the pens in water, you are creating a puddle of colour from the pen and using a damp brush with water to pick up colour in more or less diluted form to have graded colour look.

Copic markers are alcohol based and work totally differently using a spirit to move their colours.

Have a look at my tutorials with Kuretake pens in the tutorials section, there is a water colour one in there with a rubber stamp.

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